Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz and this is Ascension Presents.
So, sometimes these videos we make are like, happy and awesome and like, "No problem!
I can take it, I can receive that word ... easy."
And sometimes, the videos we make are like "Mmm, that is harder to swallow."
This might be one that is harder to swallow
but I have kind of felt the need to make this for a bit of time.
Because I've noticed something that is becoming more and more prevalent
actually, more and more common.
And it's becoming more and more common amongst Catholics who are, in all other areas,
really committed to the faith, really committed to the Lord.
Like, they go to Mass more than just Sunday, right? During the week they have holy hours,
they know their way around a rosary bead, you know that kind of a thing?
And that thing I've noticed is, more and more, they have become accustomed
—that when they're dating someone— (to) spending the night, sleeping in the same bed.
And what I hear a lot of times in these cases is, "Well, yeah, we slept in the same bed
but, you know, I stayed the night, but we didn't do anything—
we didn't do anything else, we just slept in the same bed. How is that possibly wrong?"
And "I mean, because we could have done worse"
—and I would grant that yes, yes, you could have been doing worse,
but that doesn't mean that what you did was good, right?
You know, like, you didn't do the worst possible thing, so ... *claps slowly*
There's something wrong, and actually it's a sin, to live like that:
to spend the night, to sleep in the same bed as the person you're dating.
Like, "Why? Where in the world would you get that?" Well, at least, for three reasons.
The first reason is what's called the near occasion of sin.
So, what the near occasion of sin is, is when I intentionally enter into a situation
where it is very likely, or at least very possible for me to commit a sin.
And, clearly, lying down in the same bed overnight with the person that you're in love with
opens up a lot of doors for some very serious things to happen.
Now you might say like "No, we never— haven't done anything though -- we've never
-- we do this probably three out of the seven nights of the week and nothing's ever happened."
I was like, "Well, nothing may have happened yet ... physically, but
there's something that does happen inside."
You know, sometimes— broad strokes—guys and girls being very different,
guys and girls thinking—and this is broad strokes—generally speaking,
a woman might be cuddling with a man and thinking "This is just so nice, this is just so sweet.
I just like this moment. I don't need to do anything else."
Meanwhile, the guy is going, like, "Whoa, OK, here we go!
Hey, you just give me the sign and I'm ready to take to whatever level you want."
Now again, (that's) not every guy and not every girl, but that's often, often the case,
as well as in one's mind, when you're spending the night sleeping in the same bed
your mind can go to a whole lot of different places.
Plus, you go to bed like "Now we're just gonna lay here"
and you wake up in the middle of the night like "Oh hey, there's a person that I love right next to me.
I bet he or she would want an exchange ... uh, expression of affection in this moment."
And it's just so dangerous. It's called the near occasion of sin.
To intentionally enter into the near occasion of sin is a sin.
Number two is what's called the sin of scandal.
Now scandal isn't just like, "That's shocking," like, "I can't believe these people—they're shocking."
That's not what scandal is. Scandal is living in such a way that
when people see your life what they thought was bad they now think is good
or what they thought was good, they now think is bad.
And then go in the wrong way, right?
So here you are and you're a faithful Catholic
and people know you. Jack and Jill, you guys are both faithful Catholics,
and Jill's roommate sees Jack and Jill going behind their closed door and sleeping together.
Now she doesn't know that they're not "doing anything else"
but at that point it kind of doesn't matter because of the fact that she now thinks
—the roommate now thinks— "Well Jack and Jill follow Jesus, they love Jesus.
I know, I see how they follow after him in all these other ways. This thing that's wrong must be fine."
You might say "Well, that's not my responsibility to give witness to all these people.
It's not my responsibility for their souls." Well, actually, Jesus—when he came to scandal—
he said if any of you causes one of these little ones to sin,
and if by my actions I'm causing someone — by my actions I'm saying this thing that's evil,
this thing that's dangerous, this thing that's a sin
—they'd say "Oh no, but if a faithful Catholic does this, it must not be a sin"—
if by my actions I caused one of these little ones to sin, Jesus said it will be better for that person
if a great millstone was placed around their neck and they were thrown into the sea.
That's how seriously Jesus takes the sin of scandal.
And sleeping together in the same bed is ... a sin of scandal.
The third reason is, not only is it a near occasion of sin, not only is it a sin of scandal,
but also there's something incredibly intimate about sharing a bed with a person that you love.
Now is there anything intrinsically evil about sleeping in the same bed
with someone of the opposite sex?
No, because of this: because of the fact that you could be—
the power could go out and you'd be in danger of dying in the middle of January, middle of February
—in danger of dying if you didn't kind of huddle together for warmth.
So there's nothing intrinsically wrong about that.
But this situation, even though it's not intrinsically wrong, is situationally wrong.
And so, obviously, we know that the circumstances can affect the gravity
and they also can affect the morality of an action.
In this case, the fact that, here we are, we love each other,
we don't have to cuddle together, huddle together for warmth,
we're doing this because of just simply the affection or the pleasure that it gives us ...
*Sigh*
that would be an intimate moment that ultimately
—as we know this, right?— should be reserved for your future spouse.
I mean, we kind of just, we're aware of this.
It's a serious—this is a serious thing that I think you probably recognize.
A Christian, someone who follows Christ can't— there's no room in our lives to do that
no room in our relationships to do that, for those three reasons.
For the near occasion of sin, the sin of scandal,
and for this sense of, there's something incredibly and powerfully intimate about this
that really, ultimately, should only be for your future spouse.
I don't mean to be accusing anyone, because Satan is the one who accuses.
But hopefully the Holy Spirit is convicting you.
The difference between Satan accusing and the Holy Spirit convicting—Satan accuses and says
"See, you're wrong. You don't belong in the Lord, you don't belong with Christ,
you don't belong in the Church." That's wrong, that's false, that's not true—that's Satan.
The Holy Spirit convicting says, "OK, this is what you did, let me lead you to holiness,
let me lead you to confession, let me lead you to reconciliation.
You don't have to stay in the dark, you can come into the light
and realize that you're worth loving, that you're still good even if you've made mistakes."
Even sometimes ... I've talked to some people who say
"I didn't even know, I didn't even realize that that was wrong."
For any of you who are still kind of holding out and saying "I think it's fine, I think it's OK,"
I'm just gonna ask you to consider this:
Who is your favorite saint? Who's your patron saint?
Say, like, my favorite saint is St. Teresa of Avila, my favorite saint is St. Catherine of Siena,
Mother Teresa—what an amazing saint— John Paul the Great!
If you were to ask one of them,
"Hey Mother Teresa of Calcutta,
my boyfriend and I really love each other, can we just spend the night?
We don't do anything else, we just stay the night lying in each other's arms, sleeping in each other's arms.
Is that OK?"
What do you think that she would say? What do you think, what do we think that
the holiest people that we know would say about this action?
At the very least they probably wouldn't say "Oh awesome! Go for it!"
At ... the reality, they probably would say that is grave, and dangerous, and please stop.
I know this is one of these messages, right, that's just like so ... bahh.
But, at the same time, it's worth saying and it's worth being said.
Hopefully it's worth hearing.
From all of us here at Ascension Presents, my name's Father Mike,
the big, bad, negative, angry—I'm not angry—priest.
I'm just looking out for you, that's all. I just want you guys to go to heaven. Go to heaven!
Like, subscribe, or leave your comments. Maybe you disagree with this, I don't know.
*clicks* God bless.